Russians in audacious stratobeer mission

Vid A crack Russian team has made its pitch for High Altitude Ballooning (HAB) glory by claiming to have sent a couple of beers cans into the stratosphere.

The experiment's goal was to determine whether light or dark ale has that little extra lift.

The result, as you can see from the above video, appears to be that the Kozel light beer soared to 20,180m (66,210ft) but was roundly beaten by the dark version, which hit 21,570m (70,770ft).

The mission was a curious mishmash of international kit. The beer is a Czech brew, and while one balloon was a 1982 vintage globe from the decadent US of A, the other came from the People's Republic of China.

It's not reported which of the two orbs came out on top, which is probably a wise move to avoid a commentard bloodbath down at YouTube.

Whatever the case, the beer cans were actually empty, since neither balloon had sufficient lifting power to raise a proper tin. Accordingly, we suggest that in future the Russians stick to less challenging tasks, like delivering astronauts to the ISS. ®